The Changeling
by Mikomi's Pen
Summary: Several years after the end of the Fire Bringer War, Yuber comes calling.
1. Iron

**Warnings:** Violence, gore, some sick implications but nothing explicit.

**The Changeling  
**"Iron"

At the christening, the demon was there.

It seemed at first he might have been an illusion. There'd been just a flash of him, of golden hair and dark cloth and slow feline smile, as Albert had held Elissa up to the blessing of the bishops and of Hikusaak, to the view of the gathered crowd. There'd been just a flash of him; Albert froze once the image registered, his eyes snapping back to search for the languid movement of the shark among the fish. But that flash of him was gone.

His wife saw his hesitation as indecision. When the priest took Elissa from him, to anoint her head with holy oils, he felt Lydia's small cool hand on the back of his. "Are you sure about this?" she asked, her quiet voice slipping under the hymn of thanksgiving. She didn't look at the Bishop Sival; she didn't need to; she had been expressing her misgivings since the Bishop first offered to be godfather to Elissa.

"It's a coup d'etat, Lydia," he murmured back, as he had so many times before. The familiarity of the words helped him keep his voice steady. "The Bishop's star is on the rise, and he'll take us with him."

"Yes," she agreed simply, dissatisfaction in her voice as the choir finished in a grand resolution of its major chord and the priest turned to the Bishop.

"Will you, Bishop Sival, before the eyes of our Lord Hikusaak," the priest said, his ancient and strained voice, magnified a hundred times by the rune upon his forehead, echoing off the marble walls of the circular temple, "take this child to your bosom, cherish her as though she were your own? Will you be father to her?"

Albert repressed distaste as the oiliest "I shall" he'd ever heard rose from his right.

"And you, Lady Sival, before the eyes of our Lord Hikusaak," the priest continued, "will you too accept this child as your own?"

"I will," came the voice of the Lady from Albert and Lydia's left.

"Then," the priest said, "let it be known that Elissa Eleanor Adriana Silverberg has come to the world." At this, the choir burst into loud song, drowning out the cries of his daughter as the priest submerged her once, twice, three times in consecrated water. Lydia came forward and received the squalling child, wrapped her in a winding sheet, and handed her to Albert and he turned back to the assembled throng and held her to them, something within him quite satisfied at the awe he could see.

Then, mismatched eyes and a slow smile, catching his gaze. This time, as no other time, the dark figure remained, reached up to tip his hat, standing in the crowd like a great cat in the grasses. His eyes and his grace promised much.

The choir sang its final chord, and Albert came back to himself. He lowered his daughter. When he looked up again, Yuber was gone, nothing but misgivings to show that he was ever there.

* * *

Albert saw him frequently after that, just the ghostly image of him. Perhaps it was simply the crawling of the skin after the suggestion of bugs, but still, every time, he slapped at the sensation. Every time, he turned to look. Every time, the demon was gone.

* * *

It was summer, so the windows were open to the warm night. Beside him, Lydia slept undisturbed, her not-quite snores attesting to the depth of her rest. She was most beautiful at night, was his first thought as he came awake and saw her beside him; she was most beautiful on a summer night when the windows were open and the moonlight streamed in and across her face. 

His second thought, however, was to wonder what woke him and not her. It wasn't Elissa; Lydia was a lighter sleeper than he was; she was always the one to wake when their daughter cried. And Elissa hadn't cried for several months besides; the last time had been when she'd had a nightmare and ended up sleeping in their bed.

So it wasn't Elissa, but he felt quite certain it was _something. _

When he slid out from under the covers and from bed, pulled a shirt on against the chill, Lydia woke with a snort. "Albert...?" she asked sleepily.

"It's nothing," he said, pushing his feet into slippers. "Go back to sleep." She _hmm_ed, and he hesitated with his hand on the door until her quiet snores broke the stillness once again. Then he left her.

There was light beneath Elissa's door. And although Elissa knew how to light a candle or a lantern, even though she was old enough now, she wouldn't, insisting instead that he or Lydia do it for her, just as she would have them snuff out the flame at night, as though it was their touch that would protect her from the dark.

Albert opened the door, froze.

Elissa slept, face pressed into the lines of a bad dream, beneath the demon's bared swords.

"Get away from her," Albert ordered in an explosive whisper. Even through the intervening years, he found, he hadn't lost the knack for commanding the demon; the twin swords slid from view, and the hat-brim tilted back so that he could see those shaded eyes.

"No harm," the demon said, the quirk in his lips speaking differently.

"Why are you here?" Albert asked, still in a whisper. Perhaps it was stupid, but he didn't want Elissa to wake and see this relic of his past.

"Why _would_ I be here?" Yuber asked, his voice jarringly loud in the nighttime hush. He took a single step forward, his smile even wider, and Albert took a deep breath to steady himself.

"I don't know," Albert whispered. "I never much understood the perversity of your mind. Let's step outside."

"No," Yuber said, and laughed when Albert blinked.

Uncertain, Albert said, "I don't want to wake up my daughter."

"I want to see her awake," Yuber said with a slow malice, turning back towards the sleeping child. "Will she know me? Will she fear me? She is your _spawn_, after all." He reached down toward Elissa, and Albert forced himself to walk forward, to push the demon's hand aside and step between him and his daughter.

"Stop it," Albert growled. "Don't touch her, or I'll..."

Yuber smiled wide when he didn't finish. "Or you'll what? You'll kill me?" He raised his eyebrows. "You'll hit me?" He laughed, a quiet laugh, full of cruelty. "If you could do either, boy, I'd be very much surprised." A quick movement, and suddenly the demon's blade was drawn and menacing, suddenly there was coldness at Albert's throat and a humorless smile in Yuber's eyes. "See?" he said as Albert tried to figure out how to get away from the blade. "For all that your daughter sleeps, there, for all that you might love her or might place in her all your aspirations, all your ambitions that will die with you, I could slice her open, now, split her from head to toe, twist her little limbs from her body, and all you could do would be to watch."

Albert swallowed. "Stop," he said. "You can't. We agreed - "

"Ahhh," Yuber murmured, his voice hot against Albert's face. "The agreement, yes. Let's discuss that contract." He drew his sword back slightly, nodded downward. "Sit, please."

Albert glanced down, looked back up, and sat on the edge of his daughter's bed. She stirred at that, and he should have expected that she would, she was always so sensitive to motion - she stirred, and her eyes opened, and she whispered, "Papa?"

"Hush," he said. "Go back to sleep."

But she propped herself up on her elbow, rubbing at her eyes. "What?"

He looked up at Yuber, who was leaning indolently against the wall next to the door, a smile curving his lips, then back at his daughter who stared at the demon. "It's nothing, Elissa. Go back to sleep, I said."

"What's wrong?" she asked, sitting up fully. "Who's that?"

"That's..." Albert looked up at the demon. "A friend of mine." He pressed at her back. "Go run to your mother."

"No," the demon said, running his finger along the edge of his sword. "She should stay."

Albert swallowed against his dry mouth. "All right," he said, and reached out his arm. Elissa pressed herself against his side, and he curved his arm around her little shoulders and stared the demon down, his daughter at his side making him a little bolder. "You want to discuss," he said. "Discuss."

A tiny smile, then the demon said, "You remember the terms."

"I do," Albert said.

"Then you should know why I'm here."

Albert shook his head. "I'm sorry, but as I said before - "

"You owe me lives, Silverberg." The demon smiled as Albert could think of nothing to say. "You promised me lives, and you didn't come through. You broke the contract."

Albert's heart beat harder; his throat tightened. "No," he said, then louder, "_No._ No, the contract was dissolved - our witness was dead; the contract is no more. _You _disappeared. If anyone, _you _broke it. I - " He was babbling now, he knew it. "This is outrageous. This is outrageous. You can't possibly expect..."

"Papa?" Elissa asked, her small hands digging into his side, almost painful in their grip. He stroked her head softly without taking his eyes from Yuber, took a deep breath and steadied himself. He needed his wits about him now.

When he was ready, he said, firmly, "I won't allow it."

"No?" Yuber asked, and laughed. Elissa pressed her face into Albert's shirt at the sound of it. "Try and stop me. Go on. Try." With a neat toss, he flipped his sword around so that he held it by the blade, the hilt toward Albert. When Albert hesitated, the demon nodded. "Go on."

Slowly, Albert disentangled Elissa's fingers from his shirt and stood, looked down at the sword and back at the demon's face, then down again. Behind him, the candle flickered in the breeze from the window, casting his shadow long against the wall before him and sending Yuber's face into grotesquerie. His daughter whimpered. A night-bird trilled.

He reached out and took the blade from the demon. It was heavier than he had expected, the point dipping until he grabbed it with his free hand; even more surprising, it was simple steel.

"Strike me." The demon spread his arms, leaving himself open.

This was an opportunity. He knew that. He would do something incredibly clever, vanquish the devil, and they would repeat it for years afterward, sing about it in taverns everywhere from Toran to Falena, they would tell about it and say, _there _was a strategist, the greatest man to come from the Silverbergs and damn if that wasn't saying a lot -

He was still standing there, his arms getting tired and his mind still blank.

Yuber's night vision was excellent. He couldn't blind him. He could...trip him; no, he couldn't trip him, he was agile as anything. He could trick him. Brilliant, how? _Damn it all._ He could throw the sword, grab Elissa and run - out the third-story window. No. The demon wouldn't kill him, maybe, he could create a distraction, get the door open, but no, the demon would kill him, _damn it all - _

He'd taken too long. With one fluid motion, Yuber pushed off the wall, drew his other sword, snaked it around Albert's only defense to toss it clattering to the side and grabbed Albert from behind, pressed the edge of the steel to Albert's throat. Elissa screamed, long, loud, and piercing.

The door opened, and he whispered a curse, that Lydia would be such a fool, and he raised his voice to yell, "_No, run, Lydia, run - _"

But she came into the room, all naïveté, unknowing of crime or of battle, and she pressed herself against the wall, pressed her hands over her mouth, whispered, "Oh my god - "

"Ah," Yuber laughed against Albert as he strained away from the blade. "Such an honor, to meet the tool of Silverberg's ambitions."

"Albert..." Lydia whispered, horrified.

"Run," Albert said. "_Run, damn you._"

"No," Yuber said, his voice deep and amused. "No, do stay. Sit, please. This won't take long." At his command, Lydia slid to the floor, her eyes wide and horrified, and the demon laughed aloud in delight. His mouth moved close enough to Albert's ear that he could hear the motion of the demon's lips. "Now, I am a generous soul, I am a kindly man. And though I am here to claim what's mine, I will give you a choice."

With great effort, Albert held himself still as he whispered, "And what choice is that?"

"A simple one," Yuber said. "I want one life. Just one. You may choose which one that is." With that, he released Albert, pushed him hard enough to make him hit the wall next to his wife. Elissa, wailing, threw her arms around his leg as Lydia rose to grasp his hand in hers.

But Albert couldn't respond to either of them. He couldn't understand. "You want..." The demon raised his eyebrows, tilted his head to the side, smiled, and Albert shook his head. "I can't."

"Come, boy, you've made more difficult decisions than merely that in your short span here," the demon said. "A thousand lives before you, and you've never once hesitated. A hundred thousand and you barely blinked. What's one?"

Savagely, Albert spat: "And you're one to lecture me about killing!"

"I have great experience," Yuber said with a smile. "I'm quite qualified."

Lydia whimpered. "Oh god, oh god, oh god," she whispered, over and over, until Albert turned to her, snapped, "_Will you please stop that,_" and she gasped and shut her mouth, tears spilling over from her eyes.

"I..." Albert started. "If we can make a deal - "

"No," the demon said calmly.

"Hear me out. I'm a man of influence now. I can pull the strings, I can - I can ensure a war. I can make Harmonia go to war. There will be - " He shook his head, gestured in a grand circle with his arm. "Thousands upon thousands, just for you - "

"But I'm so thoroughly enjoying this one," Yuber said with a vicious smile. "Choose." And he ran his finger down his blade, his smile promise.

His eyes traveled from the demon over to his lovely wife, her face beautiful even as she wept, even as her eyes were red, then down to Elissa, little Elissa, hiding herself against him, as though by covering her eyes every evil of the world would disappear. He dropped his hand down to smooth back her hair, the very shade of his father's hair, and he pressed Lydia's hand with all his strength.

He opened his mouth, closed it. Opened it again.


	2. Salt

**The Changeling  
**"Salt"

It was late; Caesar, dozing in the saddle, had slept past his destination and hadn't realized it. He hadn't realized it until an hour afterwards, so by the time he finally climbed sore and stinking off the horse he was exhausted and a little irritable. Nevertheless he was willing to lay money on the fact that, of the two of them, he'd be the civil one.

When he dismounted, he almost wished that he could take the horse inside with him. He was startled by how unfashionable this district was - he wouldn't go so far as to say _dangerous, _it wasn't _dangerous, _he wasn't afraid for his life, but for his horse, sure, no question. And he was startled - Albert was no hedonist, but he wasn't an ascetic, either, to be living in a place like this.

Well, no help for it. He tied the reins of his horse to the pole nearby, walked over and knocked on the door a few times, then let out a puff of breath to watch it fog on the air. By the time the condensation had disappeared, the door still hadn't opened, so he knocked again. Sure, it was some midnight or more, but if it was so damn urgent that he get here as soon as possible -

The door opened just a crack, and Caesar blinked. The man standing before him - well, looked like Albert, sort of, but was clearly Albert's evil twin or some such thing. The brother Caesar had known would never have let himself get so..._mussed_. Goodness, the man standing before him might have been mistaken for middle-middle, hell, even lower-middle class, a mistake which would have mortified the old Albert.

Caesar was aware he was gaping, so he collected his wits. "Ungodly cold out here," he said, watching his brother's face carefully for any cues. None were forthcoming, so he continued: "Can I come in?"

Albert nodded, stood aside, and Caesar walked in. He let out an experimental breath and found it still opaque. "Ungodly cold in here, too," he said, and looked back to say something, to ask something, but then got the full impact of Albert's appearance and felt kind of bad for mentally belittling Albert's disarray earlier - he really did look like hell. So instead, he asked, "Can I start a fire?"

"Go ahead," Albert said, his voice rusty and thick. Caesar shook his head, baffled, but said nothing, went over to the fireplace and bent down and looked around for a book of matches, cleared out some of the soot from the fireplace and lit a new fire. As it caught, he noticed that the newspapers he was using for kindling were months out of date. Had Albert not been heating his house all this time? What the fuck was up?

But instead of asking, he just leaned back, said, "That's better," and unwrapped the scarf from his face and pulled off his gloves. He turned back to Albert, and goddamn if in the light he didn't look even worse, but rallied with a "So - "

Albert interrupted. "Do you have it?"

Oh, good. For all that, it was still the same man, after all. "Fine, Albert, thank you for asking, and yourself?"

Albert gritted his teeth, leaned forward, made a great show of frustration. "Do you have it."

Well, fuck you. Caesar stood, sat on the couch opposite Albert, crossed his legs, and said with deliberate malice, "No." But Albert leaned back at that, _jerked _back, sharply, and looked hurt, and Caesar stared at him, and said, "Albert - what the hell is going on? We haven't talked in years - _years - _and all of a sudden Nash goddamn Latjke's goddamn bird delivers a note, nothing else, no explanation, just 'Dear Caesar, could you being me an enormously rare and expensive rune without delay, love, Albert,' except without the 'dear' and without the 'love,' and I _really _don't think that a how-are-you is all that onerous a burden."

There was silence a moment, then Albert asked, almost angrily, "Feel better?"

Caesar looked down, a little bit embarrassed for his outburst and for his lie. He shouldn't be like this, he didn't even know what Albert was going through, and it would have to be a hell of a lot for his brother to be angry instead of dry. "What the hell happened, Albert?" he asked, not ungently. "The Albert I know wouldn't live in squalor if someone paid him to live in squalor. What happened?" Albert didn't respond, and Caesar shook his head and prompted: "I heard you got married."

"So news of that reached the Island Nations," Albert said.

Whatever sympathy Caesar might have felt was lost in a wave of irritation. "Oh, I like that. I say I've heard about something you've done, you say you've heard about _everything_ I've done. That's really like you."

There was hardly a hint of emotion on Albert's face as he replied, "I was wondering why you'd come, if not to give me the rune. You came to call me arrogant." Caesar rolled his eyes with all the force he could muster, but couldn't really think of anything to say. It was just as well: after a moment, Albert looked down, rubbed absent-mindedly at his throat, then spoke, suddenly: "Her name was Lydia, she was the daughter of a bishop, she was beautiful, and she left me."

Caesar narrowed his eyes, cocked his head to the side. "Did you cheat on her?" he asked, then immediately realized how dumb a question that was. Albert had no passion, that he might compromise an alliance.

And Albert shook his head, said quietly, "I was a coward. That was why she left."

"Good reason."

"She thought so." He frowned, looked up to meet Caesar's eyes, looked down again, and Caesar was startled, because - Albert looked _sad, _genuinely _sad, _something which Caesar was pretty damn sure wasn't actually possible.

"Huh." Caesar took a moment to recover from this shock, then forged ahead: "What does that mean? That you were a coward."

Albert looked off to the side, engrossed in a cheap clock that stood there, and said, almost conversationally, "Did you hear I had a daughter?"

Sounded from the forced tone like this was getting to the point. "No."

The laugh Albert gave was forced and jarring. "I'm surprised. Well, I suppose you'd gone into your relative seclusion by then, and..." As if sensing Caesar's frown, he cut himself off. "Yes, she...She'd be three." He swallowed visibly. "This month, she'd be three."

"What happened to her?" Caesar asked quietly.

"She..." Albert took a deep breath, let it out. "You remember the demon. Yuber."

Caesar pulled a face. "Yeah."

"When I contracted with him..." Albert shook his head. "He came to us. He wanted a life. And I..."

Caesar's jaw dropped as he realized what Albert was saying. "You sacrificed..." he gasped, then cut himself off as Albert looked up with pain, deep pain, etched across his face.

"I...I thought..." He looked down again, rubbed his face with his hands. "I thought that the newest life would be the most easily replaceable."

Caesar thought a moment, then muttered, "Sometimes, your cynicism..."

Albert looked up, his eyes narrowed. "What?"

Caesar shook his head, started, "Never...," then frowned again and said, "No, that's the problem with you damn cynics. You always talk about how idealists aren't in touch with the world, but you all are every bit as bad. Human lives aren't arithmetic."

Albert laughed, and Caesar blinked at how close that laugh was to hysterics. "You think I don't know that?" he asked, louder than Caesar had ever heard him, then louder still, a shout: "Caesar, look at me - you think I don't _know that?_"

The silence after that yell was incredible - Caesar was pretty sure the fire had gone quiet, too, in awe, and it was all he himself could do to keep breathing. Albert himself looked blank - not emotionless, not like he usually was, just _blank_. Finally it was Caesar who summoned the courage to speak. "God, Albert, you're - you're a wreck."

At least Albert recovered, managed to work up a bit of dryness as he said, "Thank you," but he closed his eyes and raised his eyebrows as though wounded, and Caesar grimaced.

"I didn't mean..." he started, then thought better of it. "Why do you need it?" Albert opened his eyes; the mere motion was a question. "The rune," Caesar explained. "Why do you need it?"

"I'm going to summon a demon." Albert smiled a tiny smile, and in it was such savagery, such eagerness, that Caesar coughed a bit incredulously.

"Sorry for saying this, but - isn't that what got you in trouble in the first place?"

The smile turned a bit contemptuous, but at least it lost that unsettling edge. "At this point, do I care?" he said. "Look at me. There's nothing left. I don't care what happens to me; I just want to take my revenge, and then whatever happens to me happens to me."

"Oh." Well. "And I thought I was the gambler in the family."

"It's not gambling when you're not playing to win."

"No, I'm pretty sure it still is, but nice try." This didn't go over so well; Albert's face turned closed and hard, and he crossed his arms. Caesar coughed, a little embarrassed - but why should he be embarrassed, after the number of times Albert had ruthlessly proven his _superior intelligence _in their childhood, why should he feel bad for giving one back now they were on more equal terms? - he coughed and said, "I lied earlier."

"You have the rune," Albert said, and he didn't sound a bit surprised - the pitiful thing he'd had going on earlier, had that been an act, or was his new surety the act? Well, whatever.

"Yeah." And a bit of cruelty, and he himself didn't know why he was doing it: "I'll let you buy it off me."

The slightest pause, then, a little more weakly than Caesar had expected, "I don't have any money."

"How the hell do you not have any money?" Caesar asked, even though it was quite plain that Albert was telling the truth.

"I spent it all."

"On _what?_"

Albert pressed his lips together, and Caesar expected an outburst, how Albert wasn't accountable to him, but this new brother surprised him once again. "Men. Trackers. Mercenaries that would find Yuber. It was futile - I should have known it was futile. I'd spent a lot of it on my home."

"_This_ place?"

Another flatly contemptuous look. "No."

"Well, why didn't you sell it?"

"Lydia wanted it."

"And you gave it to her?" Albert's silence was assent. "_Why?_"

"I don't know," Albert said.

"Well, why don't you write Mom or Father? Ask them to send you money?"

"They wouldn't give it to me. They'd tell me to sell the house out from underneath her."

"Really," Caesar said, "she's a bishop's daughter, she wouldn't have the money to buy a house herself?"

A little louder, with a little edge: "That's not the _point._"

And Caesar blinked as it hit him. "You loved her?" He shook his head when, once again, Albert didn't respond. "I thought - "

"That's new," Albert said, but it lacked the usual nasty edge. "Besides, I don't think our parents would approve of all this. I think they'd just want me to write it off as a loss." Caesar shook his head, started to ask what that meant, when Albert cut him off. "None of this matters," he said. "I have no money. I can't buy it from you, I can't give you any sort of recompense. What do you want?"

"An apology." Before he'd even thought about the words they were out, and it was only a matter of willpower that he kept from grimacing, kept from making it look even more pathetic.

There was very little reaction, though, which was better than Caesar had expected; there was no scorn, no derisive laughter, just a little tilt of the chin upwards and a calm, "For?" Caesar opened his mouth to respond, thought better of it, shook his head, but Albert persisted: "For being a poor brother, perhaps?" This time Caesar _did _wince, and Albert nodded. "Well, then, I'm sorry for that. I'm sorry for the wrongs you think I've dealt you; I'm sorry for not being the brother you wanted; I'm sorry for mistreating you, for belittling you and hurting you. Is that what you want?"

Yes. Goddamn, yes. Those words, with a little more emotion maybe but still those words, were everything he wanted. "No." He gave an unconvincing little snort. "I was just joking. Never mind. I didn't mean it. You think I'm that clichéd?" He reached into his pocket and pulled out the rune crystal, buzzing with power, and held it up to show to Albert. "I don't need anything from you." So he tossed it into Albert's lap; his brother wasn't quick enough, and it bounced out before he could catch it, so Caesar stood and picked it up and, uncomfortable, handed it to him directly.

"Thank you," Albert said quietly as Caesar returned to his chair. He held the crystal against the firelight, and a quiet sad smile played across his lips as the rune inside came clear. He dropped his hand back to his lap, then said again, "Thank you." Another moment of silence, then: "What are you going to do now?"

He understood what Albert was asking, but stalled. "Sleep, I think. It's been a while - " the last with the reedy voice of an old man, as though he hadn't slept since his birth three centuries before. It was a pretty lame joke, but Albert reacted as though he actually found it funny, the severe line of his mouth softening for just an instant.

"You're welcome here, but I meant longer-term."

Right. "What are _you _going to do?"

"I'll perform the ritual tomorrow night," Albert said without hesitation. "You should be gone by then. It won't be safe."

Slowly, wondering when, exactly, he'd gotten so overwhelmingly stupid, Caesar asked, "Could you use my help? In the...ritual?"

Albert actually got more still, more expressionless. After a long pause, he said, perfectly neutrally, "It's dangerous."

But Caesar was both stupid _and _persistent. "But could you?"

Finally, a little edge to his brother's voice. "You don't know what you're offering, Caesar. Look at me." He waited until Caesar was looking him directly in the eye, and then he said, slowly, levelly, "Demons are not to be dealt with lightly."

Irritated by Albert's customary condescension, when Caesar spoke it was with more heat, more force than he had anticipated. "She was still my niece, Albert."

Albert leaned back, so that his face was in shadow and Caesar was frustrated that he couldn't read it. After a long pause, he said, "Fine." Another pause. "But if you get hurt..." And Caesar's breath almost caught in his throat, anticipating the end of that sentence, the validation or condemnation that it might bring - but it never came. "Anyway, thank you," Albert said, softly. "We should get some rest."

Sore from that, from the shortfall, Caesar sniffed with all the contempt he could muster. "You know, Albert, you're too fucking literal for this family."

Still, Albert's face was in shadow, but his voice was a little less certain when he said, "I beg your pardon?"

"You're too literal," Caesar repeated. "You always were. When people talked about the Silverbergs' demons, you know, they were talking about Mom's drinking, Father's whores, Grandfather's opiates, not _demons_." He paused, but there was no reaction, even though that was pretty fucking funny, certainly funnier than his earlier joke. "I'm not sure if you were clear on that," he finished, frustrated.

Still no reaction, until finally Albert stood. "We should get some rest," he said, calm and quiet, then walked off, not even bothering to tell Caesar where he should sleep, if there were pillows or blankets he could use, so rather than swallow his pride he took off his boots, belt, and bag, emptied his pockets, and lay down on the ratty, moldy old couch on which he'd been sitting.


	3. Circle

**Notes: **Oh my god, this thing went through more rewrites than an NBC sitcom. Oh-ho, I am so glib. Anyway, the final two chapters just need some minor revisions, so they'll be up relatively soon.

**The Changeling  
**"Circle"

There was something he'd forgotten about the summoning ritual: somehow, the ancient magic forced into your mind thoughts unbidden and unwanted. So the ancient magic showed things to Albert while he chanted, things he didn't particularly wish to see; he remembered things.

First: Elissa. First and always Elissa. In his mind, she was only a few months old. It was just after she'd started talking (and it had been so much more amusing to him than it was to Lydia that her first word had been a bastardization of "hungry"; Lydia had been hoping for "Mama") when he'd settled her down on his lap to read, because she was always imitating what he was doing and he was hoping she'd learn to read soon and would learn to comprehend so that he could share with her some of the political manuals he'd written. But it had been late and she'd been tired, so she'd fallen asleep, her hand curled clenching his shirtfront. When he'd bent down to resettle her, she murmured in her sleep, "Papa," and he'd been so utterly charmed that he'd just watched her sleep for a quarter-hour.

Then Lydia: Lydia, in their courtship, just after her father had introduced them. She'd been the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen, pale hair, wide eyes, slim waist. How ridiculous she'd made him back then! He had never thought he would fall in love, but for those eyes he had fallen. When he'd gone on campaign in the south, he'd written her letters - not love-letters, but letters, and he had lived for her replies. That was what he thought of: how on that campaign and that one alone, the other soldiers had treated him like a comrade, because he, as they, understood the agony of waiting for letters. And he thought of the way he'd waited an agonizing month after his return to ask her to marry him, because he didn't want to be seen like the silly romantic soldiers who married their sweethearts as soon as they got back. And he thought of the way her hair had smelled when she'd said yes and he'd embraced her.

Then Caesar, who somehow came to him when a wise man would have stayed and stayed when the wise would have gone. And earlier that day, coming home from walking alone with his thoughts to find Caesar there, a crust of bread in his hand:

_"Well, good to see someone's washed off the invisible paint. I managed to find food and everything, if not you, thanks for your concern."_

_"I'm surprised. I expected to find you gone." And if Albert had been anyone else, he might have winced, then, because it had sounded ungrateful even to his ears._

_"Me?" Even though Caesar's laugh had been light there'd been a current of hurt in it. "What, you think I'd run away?"_

_"I'd at least have expected you to put up a few protests. There's none of your usual whining about how something isn't a good idea..."_

_"I'm glad to see you're feeling better. Look, I'm twenty-two years old, Albert. Maybe once I would have whined, but it's your plan, and you don't think I might have possibly matured a little?"_

_"No."_

_"You really are feeling like your old self."_

_"Are you sure you'll be able to go through with this?"_

_"You managed. If you managed, I can manage."_

And then the memory of Elissa wailing when the demon laid his cold hand upon her, the memory of Lydia beating his chest and weeping until she had no more voice and no more strength, and he almost wanted to turn to his brother, standing behind him, and tell him that he didn't manage at all. But then his imagination summoned up a tiny mangled body, and he couldn't bring himself to give the warning.

Then, strangely, there was the thought of his father, the last time they'd seen him - he'd smiled warmly at Caesar, tousling his hair, then nodded curtly at Albert, then turned and gone to the woman who was waiting for him. And there had been such utter dispassion in his eyes, such coldness, that Albert could have turned to his brother, nine and small and fragile, and killed him for jealousy. But Albert pushed all that away.

He knew then without knowing how that he'd come to the apex of his chant. He drew a deep breath, inhaled the incense and scent of dank earth, and placed the rune beneath his foot. A few more words, and -

_And Caesar, flashes of his brother, playing chess against himself to become better, waiting alone for Albert, studying, laughing, playing - Caesar, caught in the throes of an epileptic fit - Caesar, creeping into his room during a thunderstorm - Caesar, defending him to their father even though Albert sat silent - Caesar, bullied by the older boys that Albert had to step in - Caesar across a battlefield with chin set - _And he knew that everything here was his brother's to lose. If tragedy would strike, it would strike Caesar, and he didn't know if he could inflict that even upon his brother.

But it was no time for indecision. It was critical mass. He leaned forward and the crystal split beneath him, the energy flying around the room, and he called, his voice ringingly clear -

"Pesmerga! Pesmerga! Pesmerga!"

And there was a crack, a scent, and a smoke-wreathed figure in the pentagram before him. And the spell left him with one last memory, _Yuber smiling slyly and reaching for him as he shrank away, _before fading from his mind entirely and leaving him alone in the basement with his brother and the demon.

Pesmerga was as large as Yuber had been back then, stood as tall as he had. He might have been his twin but for the fall of hair from beneath his visored helmet - dark where Yuber's had been pale. And while Yuber had started after that first moment pacing the confines of the pentagram, restless and feline, Pesmerga might have been a statue had it not been for the slight in-out of his breath. But still, they were so similar as to make Albert wonder if they weren't possibly of the same cloth.

"Pesmerga." He was pleased with the way that had come out - not resounding like before, maybe, but still firmly and confidently. "My name is Albert Silverberg."

"Silverberg," Pesmerga repeated, deep, cool, placid. There was not a hint of curiosity in his voice, not a hint of emotion, when he asked, "Of the family that bears ties to the demon Yuber?"

Warily, Albert said, "Yes."

"And you." With hardly a motion, hardly a breath, Pesmerga lashed out with his hands, grasping Albert around the throat and lifting him effortlessly until his feet scrabbled against the floor, unable to find purchase, and all Albert could think is _This isn't right; he shouldn't be able to touch me; he shouldn't be able to reach outside the circle - _But the breath that could hardly press itself flat enough to get by the demon's fingers struggled, leaving his heart and his mind pounding at their mortal barriers, trying to spring out into the air -

Pesmerga was still speaking. "You summoned him into this world."

Albert fumbled for the knife he'd put in his pocket, for the purpose of completing the ceremony, but his fingers didn't catch and it dropped to the ground and bounced away. And he was painfully aware of how ridiculous he must look, with his mouth working like a fish-jaw, his hands weak crooks, but couldn't bring himself to much care with the pressure building inside, with the pain of the metal of his gauntlets digging into his flesh. He lashed out with a foot, trying to kick the demon in the groin and missing again and again -

A flash to the left; Caesar was charging the demon, fist drawn back, a cry on his lips, and Albert redirected his kick towards his brother, half in the hope of knocking him away from the demon and half for the satisfaction of it. He missed again, but Pesmerga was there, lashing out with an elbow and catching Caesar beneath the ribcage so that he fell back with a sound, a _whoomph _that was almost comical, curling around the wound with a twitch and a grimace that were as far from funny as possible.

Then Pesmerga released his grip, and Albert fell, found his feet quite thoroughly unable to support his weight and fell a bit further. He couldn't stop coughing, couldn't stop himself from almost morbidly feeling at his neck. The grooves where the demon's fingers had dug in were tender - he had little doubt they would bruise, felt more than a little surprise that beneath those fingers his throat hadn't collapsed.

A shimmer in his periphery; Pesmerga slipped a knife between his clutching hand and his neck, its chill a threat so much more earnest in its darkness than Yuber's, mocking and cruel, ever had been. He looked up, and perhaps in the darkness of the demon's visor he saw a shine that might have been an eye, or perhaps nothing at all.

"Where is he?" Pesmerga asked calmly.

Albert tried to speak and found that his voice caught, tried again with more success. "This is unnecessary."

Pesmerga was having none of it, pressing his knife in harder, then drawing back. "Tell me," he said, "or I'll kill that one." He indicated Caesar with a tilting motion of his head. Albert looked over at his brother, who was only starting to recover, struggling to his knees, and swallowed.

"This is unnecessary," he tried again. "I've summoned you to find him. So you can take your revenge."

No reaction, save another slight pulling back, so that he could no longer feel the blade against his skin. "So I can take my revenge," Pesmerga said, without inflection, so that Albert couldn't tell if it was question or mere musing. He decided, for safety's sake, to treat it as the former.

"And mine."

"You would have me be a servant to you, then." At least there was a bit of emotion there, even if it was disgust.

"It's a symbiotic relationship." Albert gave as nonchalant a shrug as he was able, collapsed on the floor with a knife at his throat. "You won't be able to find him without me; I won't be able to kill him without you."

"Then you know where he is," Pesmerga said.

"I do." It was what he'd spent his fortune on - men who could track a demon to its lair, men who would give him the name of a demon consumed by hatred. Information of that sort was hard to come by, and a lesser man might have given up, but Albert Silverberg had decided that he was to have his revenge. "I do."

Pesmerga nodded and stepped back, sheathing his knife; Albert let out the breath he'd been holding, then gingerly, shakily, stood. "Very well," Pesmerga said, then paused. "I can't contract with you. Not with Yuber's taint on you." And the demon looked beyond Albert; Albert turned to look at Caesar, who was on his feet but looking haggard and looking scared, touching the trickle of blood where he'd bitten his lip. He noticed their attention and looked at them both warily.

"What?"

Now Albert hesitated. He'd intended for Caesar to be the witness to the deed, and while the obligation was not without risks, it certainly didn't have the same dangers as actually contracting. The demon couldn't attack the witness, just as it couldn't attack the contractor, though certainly it would be able to put either in a position to die if it so wished. But if a demon did want its way out of a contract, they almost always went after the contractor first. Albert didn't know if he would be able to ask Caesar to undergo that for a revenge that wasn't even his.

But he'd forgotten that Caesar was no idiot. After that first confusion, his expression cleared, and he shrugged. "Sure. Of course I'll do it."

"You know that it's dangerous?" Albert asked, and Caesar shrugged again. And if he was such a fool after all, who was Albert to turn him down? "All right. Then I'll serve as witness."

There was a moment of surprise, as though Caesar hadn't expected him to agree so readily, but that faded. "I don't know what to do. Walk me through it."

Albert closed his eyes a moment, running through the ritual in his mind, then looked around. He spotted the knife he'd dropped a bit behind Caesar; he went and picked it up and handed it to his brother. "First you cut your hand deeply enough to draw blood." Caesar pulled a face and lowered the blade to his hand. "Not too deeply, though," Albert added.

"Fun," Caesar said, and drew the knife across his hand lightly. He looked up at Albert and shrugged apologetically when it drew no blood, then tried again with a bit more force. "Ow, fuck."

"Good. You - " Albert looked up to see that Pesmerga was already holding out his hand, gauntlet removed, a deep score across his palm. His skin was exactly the same shade as Yuber's, he saw, and somehow he couldn't help but be fascinated - but he tore his attention away. In any case, it was clear that he needed no prompting in the ritual. "You clasp hands and let your blood mingle."

"Oh." Caesar looked at the demon's outstretched hand, then tried to peer into his face. "Promise me you don't have syphilis," he joked. The demon said nothing, and he looked at Albert. "That's one that's spread by blood, right? Syphilis?"

"I don't know." Albert looked at the demon and shifted uncomfortably as a bit of blood fell to the floor but Pesmerga didn't move in the least. "We should probably just go ahead and do this."

"Okay," Caesar said, nodded and muttered, "Okay." He grasped Pesmerga's hand and hissed a little in pain. "I'm okay," he said so softly that Albert was relatively certain he was saying it to himself.

"State your name," Albert said.

"Caesar." Albert tried to tell him, but couldn't get the words out, and how strange was that, that he couldn't even speak so simple a correction? But Caesar understood. "Oh. Caesar Thomas Silverberg."

Albert nodded. "And you. State your name."

"Pesmerga," the demon said.

"What duties do you lay upon Pesmerga, Caesar Thomas Silverberg?" Albert asked. And Caesar looked at him, as if for prompting; Albert shook his head, and Caesar shrugged.

"I, uh...I would have him destroy the demon Yuber."

"What duties do you lay upon Caesar Thomas Silverberg, Pesmerga?"

"To assist me in my search until the demon Yuber is destroyed," Pesmerga said.

"And do you each swear to assist and do no harm to the other, and to follow each the will of the other?"

"I so swear," Pesmerga said, and Caesar echoed him quietly.

"I, Albert Michael Silverberg, bear witness to this oath. So long as I live, its tenets are firm." He placed his hand over theirs, pressed them together, and released them again. Then he stepped back. "That's it."

Caesar looked up and pulled his hand quickly from the demon's grasp. "Seriously? No more?"

"Come on. I'll bandage your hand." Albert looked back at the demon and said, "You may use anything in this house to make your preparations until we leave tomorrow. You may not leave the house."

"That's not your order to give," Pesmerga said softly.

Albert hesitated. "Right. Caesar. Tell him."

"What?" Caesar looked up from massaging his hand, looked over at the demon. "Oh. Uh, what he said."

"Very well. But, Silverberg - " The demon was silent a moment, then said, "You will find me different from Yuber."

He didn't say anything else, and Albert wondered if that was a promise or a threat. So he just nodded and said, "All right." Then he turned to Caesar. "Come on."

Albert found a bit of clean linen and wiped the wound clean before tying it up. Caesar bore through it in silence, which surprised Albert quite a bit - he'd expected complaints. Concerned in spite of himself, he looked up at his brother. "Are you all right?"

"Yeah," Caesar said, then shrugged. "I just...I don't feel well, is all."

"Don't feel well? Like..." Albert looked into his face, looking into his eyes. "You're not going to have a fit," he said.

"Are you asking or telling?" Caesar said and laughed half-heartedly. "No, it's not like having...Actually, it's exactly like I feel before I have a fit, but I'm not going to have one, it's not that," he said. "It's...This feels unnatural, Albert. This feels _wrong._"

The memory was distant, now, but Albert remembered thinking that very thought himself, back then. Even more distant, he remembered a time when he didn't feel like he felt now. He frowned and nodded, he understood, and he would have liked to have been able to tell Caesar that it would be all right, but the only sad comfort he could offer was, "You grow accustomed to it."

For some reason, this made Caesar laugh. "Well, that's good to hear," he finally managed.

Albert watched his brother's hysterics or mockery. "Are you regretting your decision?" he asked.

"No," Caesar laughed. "Oh, no, of course not." Then, slightly more seriously: "I try not to regret anything I've done, and this - well! Tying myself to a demon in order to exact some empty - " He cut himself off. "Forget it."

Albert tied off the cloth around Caesar's hand, nodded, and went off to be alone so that he could justify not feeling guilty over what he'd done.


	4. Cross

**The Changeling  
**"Cross"

"There are times when I think she may still be alive."

The day before, they had left the road for the mountains. They had traveled steadily southwest from Crystal Valley for over a week, always following a paved highway that had branched off into a muddy path that had still been passable by horse, but now they had left even the comfort of that - and their beasts - behind. Caesar had been surprised when he'd been the one who'd struggled, but Pesmerga, for all his heavy armor, and Albert, for all his poor health, were both driven forward by their determination. Both of them scrambled upward over rocks and up hills, heedless of injuries or danger. Nighttime, when they camped, was a relief, because then Caesar could tell the difference between them: Pesmerga maintained his tension, trembling in anticipation of the morning when they would once again start moving; Albert, on the other hand, became weary, aimless, and relatable once again.

He also became, if Caesar was careful not to bring him back onto his guard, much more talkative. So Caesar crumbled a dry, fibrous twig between his fingers and tossed it in the fire and tried to sound disinterested. "Really?"

"It's certainly a possibility," Albert said. "I think...Yuber's original intention was to take me, and he's never really wanted me dead." Caesar didn't prompt him, so he went on, a little bitterly. "I _entertain _him."

"Really?" Caesar said, joking as gently as he could. "You've always seemed quite a drag to me."

Albert didn't respond to that at all, not even a smile or anything. After a long pause, he said, "I used to - to dream of finding a True Rune. I used to want nothing so much as immortality, in whatever form it might take."

"Used to?"

"Look at them," Albert said, jerking his chin at the dim outline of black armor against the black sky. "Hardly a day went by when Yuber wasn't evaluating everything for its _entertainment _value. I think sometimes they play this game merely out of boredom - Pesmerga always seeking, Yuber always running. Yuber especially; I think he must be older, must have been bored longer, because he controls the pursuit. He could end it at any time. But he keeps running, and Pesmerga keeps chasing, because that's what they do."

"You think?" Caesar said, watching the firelight flash against the shadow. "I don't know. I'd like to think it was more noble than that."

"Of course you would." Strangely, that wasn't mocking. "But it isn't a matter of good and bad. Look at Pesmerga; he may be different from Yuber, but that doesn't make him good. He's merely the lesser of two evils."

Caesar thought about that and found it unsettling. "Maybe we shouldn't be using him, then."

"Maybe not," Albert said. "But for now our goals are in line. He wants what we want. We can use him."

"Still, doesn't it seem strange to you?" Caesar said. "Going with your Grand Theory of Demons - I mean, just look at him. You think a whim, a hey-I'm-bored - you think he'd be all that devoted to just that?"

"It's funny," Albert said, a not-quite-smile gracing his face, "how easily a whim consumes you."

"What does that mean?" Caesar asked, but he'd pushed too far; Albert drew into himself, his face closed, and he looked up again with damnable composure.

"We'll get there tomorrow," he said.

Well, that was one hell of a relief; Caesar wasn't sure how much of this climbing he could take. "What d'you think we'll find?"

"His lair - " That spoken with a touch of irony - "is in a cave, appropriately enough. I was given no more details than that."

"What if your daughter's there?"

Albert looked Caesar in the eyes, then looked away again. "I can't get my hopes up."

"Why not?"

"_Because_," Albert said sharply, then, quieter, "Because she probably won't be."

Caesar was a bit startled when something as asinine as "I'm surprised you love her so much" spewed forth from his mouth, but it was out there and it was awful, and Albert looked up at him with closer to true anger than he'd ever seen from his brother directed at him.

"She's my _daughter,_" he said.

"Well, sure, but - you never cared for the family - "

"Is that what you think?" Albert asked, and Caesar shook his head at the harshness in his voice. "That's what you think?"

"Yeah," Caesar said.

Something hard came over Albert's face, something sad and angry, and he stood without another word and walked over to his bedding and lay down. Caesar shook his head, confused, and waited for him to call back a last word, but none came. And he waited for Albert to stop being all sulky, because Albert wasn't _sulky, _ever, because that would mean being affected by that. But when he woke with sun on his face, sore from having slept awkwardly propped up against a rock, Albert hadn't moved from the spot. As he stretched against his aches, Caesar realized that he didn't know his brother.

* * *

They came the next afternoon to a huge cavern in the mountains, empty but for at the back a great door, fitted all the way to the thorny roof, made of a solid, dark metal. It had studs for decoration and a single loop of iron for a knob, and at the base of it, small before it, propped up like a doll was the form of a little girl. 

Caesar knew her. She was horrific, but he knew her. The child looked like no child should: her stomach was swollen, her face emaciated; the chest beneath her ripped dress was bony, smeared with filth and blood, her skin dark with it; her face was painted obscenely, her prominent cheekbones pink with rouge, her eyes frosted, her lips a foully dark red. But there were two things that made him swallow his nausea: first, beneath the grime and grease her lanky hair was scarlet; and second, she was alive.

Beside him, Albert made a tiny sound, a soft sob of disbelief, and Caesar reached out to grasp his arm, to hold him back in case it was a trap, but it was Albert - of course he already knew it was a trap. So Albert shook off the grip, took a step forward, and opened his mouth to say something when Yuber appeared.

A great tension went through Pesmerga, an enormous jerk as he went for his sword then forced himself to relax again. He said nothing, just stalked a few steps closer, then snorted and turned his back on the other demon. Caesar looked at Pesmerga, then up at Yuber, and shook his head. "What..."

"Too scared to come out here in person, Yuber?" Pesmerga rumbled. And Caesar looked up at him and realized - there _did _seem to be something wrong with the demon, something...less focused, perhaps.

Yuber's illusory eyes flickered down to Pesmerga a moment, a tiny smile on his lips, then over to Albert. "Quite the company you've taken to keeping, Silverberg," Yuber said. "Calling the little boy, just for me?" Pesmerga grunted in annoyance; Albert said nothing. "And..." His creepy fucking eyes settled on Caesar and made the nausea flare up again. "Mm. The estranged brother. Isn't _that _fun?" Yuber's smile went a little wider. "Tell me, boy, what do you think? If I'd offered your brother the option, would he have settled on you as the sacrifice?"

"Shut the fuck up," Caesar said, swallowing his sickness.

"I think he would have. Pity," Yuber said, contemplative. "I wish I'd thought of it. You really are quite..." The unfinished thought hung serpentine in the air, and Caesar felt a stab of - of _fear - _run down his back, settle in his stomach, roiling things there, and he wished powerfully that he had never come, that he was anywhere else -

Mouth dry, Caesar turned to his brother and said, "Tell me why the fuck we're listening to this thing?"

"It's a valid point." Albert's voice was thin even though his words were confident. "I'm guessing you have something to say. So say it."

There was a moment when Yuber's smile stretched, became something grotesque and masklike. Then: "She screamed."

The two words were foul, and once again Caesar reached out to grip his brother's arm. Albert was tense, trembling, but this time he _wrenched_ his arm away, violently. And Caesar dared to take his eyes from the illusion to see Albert isolated, fiercely alone and as furious and pale as he had ever been.

"It was entertaining at first," the demon continued, "her cries, but eventually, _time_ after _time_ after _time_ after _time - _" and with each repetition, Caesar could see a little more of his brother's steely control stripped away, until finally, he made a tiny noise, a single moan of protest, and Yuber broke off with a grin. "What is it, Silverberg? Don't like me paying attention to someone else?"

Caesar looked over at his brother, but with that noise, Albert had regained his control; his face was flat, impassive. The illusion laughed and continued.

"But it got _old, _you understand. The screams just got irritating." It shrugged. "So what was I to do? I silenced her, finally - stuffed something in her just to shut her up. It quieted her." Again, the demon laughed, tapping his lip with a gloved finger. "Now, what could that something have been?" He shook his head. "No matter. She's quiet now, and I have no more use for her. Have her back."

Albert started, looked at his still daughter, looked back at the demon, and said, quietly, "And the catch?"

"Catch?" Yuber said. "None. Just - " Deliberately: "I'll be moving on soon. If you want to come see me before I go, you may want to act quickly."

Evidently, there was no more; the illusion vanished. And Albert walked forward with shaky steps, slow, wary, until he came to his daughter's side and knelt down and took her in his arms. Caesar was close enough to see the way his brother's face crumpled, in relief or sorrow or joy, when slowly, the little girl reached up and clasped her arms around his neck. Caesar was also close enough to see her eyes and realize that it was a knee-jerk reaction - that the little girl was dead to the world, that she would have done this for anyone - she didn't know that it was her father holding her. But how could he say that aloud?

"My little Elissa," Albert whispered, petting her hair, and Caesar didn't know whether to cry or vomit to see the way he held her - the look on his face, the love for everything he'd lost when he'd lost her. "I'm sorry, I abandoned you, but I came back, didn't I? I came back."

Pesmerga was trying the door, pulling at the heavy iron ring, straining against it. It didn't move. He ran his hands over the door, searching.

"What, is it locked?" Caesar said to him, desperate to look away from his brother.

"Yes," Pesmerga said flatly, but pulled on the door one more time for good measure. Then he took a step back and looked over, and Caesar followed his gaze to the pair, to Albert and his daughter, then looked back at Pesmerga.

"Warms the heart, doesn't it," Caesar said miserably.

But Pesmerga cared nothing for the emotion of the scene, cared nothing for Albert; it was Elissa he was focused on. In two steps he was by their side, pushing Albert away with one arm, tearing his grip from his daughter, even though her arms held on, her fingers interlaced around his neck until finally they were dragged apart.

"What - " was all Albert had time for before Elissa was pressed flat against the stone floor, a knife at her throat. And it was too quick - a short jerk in Pesmerga's elbow, a soft bubbling noise, and then nothing - nothing; Caesar had expected a scream, a whimper, something, but there was just a wet breath, a gesture, a sick squelch as Pesmerga pulled something free, and then a hushed impact as he carelessly dropped Elissa's thin, tiny red body.

Caesar looked down at the little girl, his little niece, her dull eyes still open - had she been that lifeless even then, that she didn't even flinch from the cut? But her lips, her dark lips, they seemed almost to smile above the smile in her neck. It seemed as though there was some secret that only she knew. It was as though that quick cut had been a joke.

"No." Albert shook his head, took a step forward, another, and with each step cried, louder and louder, "No, no, no, no - " He fell to his knees beside her, wrapped his arms around her, pressed his face into her distended belly, moaning, "_No. Not my Elissa." _His breath hitched, and he seemed unaware of anything around him."_Not my little girl,_" he sobbed. "_Not my little girl._"

"Oh fuck," Caesar whispered and somehow found his legs to take the few steps forward to touch his brother's shoulder. It was a mistake; the touch energized Albert, so that he jerked back and looked back at Caesar, his face made terrible by the stain of his daughter's blood and made terrible by something more. There was just a moment of softness, a motion of the lips that might have been a whisper of _I'm sorry _or might have been a breathy damnation.Then, with a speed Caesar had never thought he might possess, he was on the demon, tearing furiously at anything, everything he could reach, hitting again and again with weak fist at the visor.

Then again, a tiny effortless motion, and Albert fell back with blood on his chest.

Caesar looked down, disbelieving, then back up, and down again. This was unbelievable. This was _ridiculous._ He knew better than anyone that his brother was immortal. Other kids wouldn't even challenge Albert - he was too much, too powerful, striding unbreakable with Caesar taking shelter in his shadow. Lightning bowed before Albert, storms, demons of the night who made this demon of the day nothing. Albert was the one who made his fear nothing; the day he had fallen from Albert's graces was the day he'd become vulnerable, because Albert was his shield, his protector.

So how could the unbreakable lie here before him, shattered?

The explanation was easy: it wasn't Albert at all. This, like the demon before, was an illusion. He had been the whole time; that was why he'd been so open, before, that was why he'd shown anger, fear, sorrow - the real Albert was hiding still, this was all a great experiment to see how he'd grown, if he'd grown. His brother was still alive.

He dropped to his knees beside this man who could not possibly be Albert, whose face was shining with sweat and whose breath was still coming, sharply in shallow starts. With great effort, not-Albert, the illusion, gathered a breath that whistled in his chest and wheezed out, "This was a mistake..." Another breath, even more labored than the one before, and a breathy word that might have been "Sorry" - and then a cough, an etching of something that was like anger, like disgust, something deep and dissatisfied. Caesar touched his face and realized that he was solid and that he was dead.

"That's it?" he asked his brother. "That's all?"

But he'd forgotten Pesmerga was there, that anything was there. When he looked up to see him unlocking the door with the key pulled loose from little Elissa, something that was closer to hate than he'd ever felt flared somewhere below the hollow of his throat. The demon seemed to understand him, tipped his chin up a touch. "Don't be stupid," Pesmerga said. "Our witness is dead; our contract is shattered. If I need to kill you, I can."

"Do it, then." Caesar was dimly aware of the way his hand had worked itself into Albert's collar, the way his breath was coming in short harsh pants. "Fucking murderer. Fuck _you. You_ broke the contract."

"I was merely defending myself," Pesmerga replied, so levelly, calmly, that Caesar might have let go of his brother, would have charged the demon, if not for Albert's example. "He forfeited his own protection."

"Oh, he posed a great fucking harm to you! Fuck, fuck, _fuck - _no," he whispered, and fell back, sitting down heavily. He looked down at Albert, at his dead brother, at his face that had no peace. "Lesser of two evils," he whispered to himself, and clenched his jaw.

The demon pulled on the iron door, and with a great creak, it swung open. A breath of coppery air puffed out with it, and Pesmerga nodded once, satisfied. Then he looked back at the bodies and Caesar, sitting among them.

"Your brother's only sorrow, contractor, is that he died before he saw his vengeance enacted. I hope my assurances of success will speed his spirit's flight."

"You lousy _fuck,_" Caesar said. "This was never about revenge. This was..."

"Wasn't it?" Pesmerga asked. "You think that by regaining his daughter, he might have reclaimed what he lost? You think that was even what he wanted?" The demon waited for that to sink in, waited for him to understand, then said, "He came into this believing his daughter was dead. Everything has turned out as he wanted: his daughter is dead, and Yuber shall be."

It was logical, yes, so fucking right and logical, but - "_Lose,_" Caesar whispered, focusing into that single word such hatred and venom that even Pesmerga seemed to rock back a little. "Lose. I don't care, I hope he _kills_ you, I hope he slits your throat and you _die_ and he pisses on your corpse, I hope he tears you into pieces, makes you into _shit_, I hope you're wiped from whatever sorry _fucking_ world you came from."

And even Pesmerga had to take a tiny pause before he spoke, but when he did speak it was as low and level as it ever was.

"I'm not the villain here. He was the one who engineered all this."

Of course Caesar knew that, of course he knew, but there was nothing inside him that cared - Pesmerga might have been the lesser of the two, but he was still fucking evil. And Caesar couldn't understand why his brother would have trusted in that. Why he would have lost himself so much to have trusted...

"Go the fuck away," Caesar spat, and reached over and took Albert's cold hand in his. And Pesmerga nodded without another single word, and turned away and stepped into the curtains of blackness that lay beyond that great iron door. It swung shut behind him, leaving Caesar alone in the shambles of silence of the cave.

He crawled over to Elissa, brushed the hair from her face and closed her glazed green eyes and pulled her dress up to cover her more properly. And he clenched his jaw as he realized how much she looked like Albert, how she had his nose and his eyes and a high bone structure that made him think she'd have grown up to be a strategist.

He brought her over to lie beside his brother, moved Albert's hand so it lay atop her head, then swallowed and moved it back. Then he scrambled away from them and found an open corner and vomited until his guts ached and his mouth burned, then sat back, exhausted, and wondered how he could carry them both back down the mountain, back to their homeland, for their burials.

* * *

(A/N: AH HAH HAH HAH HAH oh goodness. Because to let Albert get out of this alive would be utter blasphemy. He never does. Anyway - single most horrific thing I've ever written. One last marginally gentler chapter to go.) 


	5. Consecrated Ground

**The Changeling  
**"Consecrated Ground"

They asked him what music to use at the funeral. He didn't know. That was when he'd almost broken down the first time, when he realized that he didn't know what Albert would have wanted to hear at his own funeral, so when he'd sent messages to his parents, he'd posed the question to each of them. Neither sent a response. He wrote a second message, more concise than the first, saying that Albert had loved them; again, they didn't respond. His third letter was the shortest of all: _Fuck you both._ Only when it was sent did he consider that the letters probably hadn't even arrived yet.

In the end, he commissioned a requiem mass from a friend of a friend, an unsuccessful composer. He could imagine Albert wanting something dramatic, though he probably would have been irritated if he'd known about the nepotism, the indulgence of a lesser talent.

He had grand plans for the event. He would go up and say everything that needed to be said. He would go up and make sense of Albert's death, to himself and to all the people there - he would speak of how Albert had been a brilliant man, cunning, shrewd, but how he had been a cynic on an idealist's quest and that had destroyed him. He would spare nothing, and it would be a tragic portrait of a complex man whose good ultimately outweighed his bad. And then Leon, their grandfather, he would come up and speak, say that the loss of his boy was tragic; he would scold the attendants for their mistreatment of Albert, because Caesar couldn't do that. And he'd say that even though it was a tragedy, he had trust that Caesar would be more than competent to take up the mantle of the Silverberg family. But as it turned out, the tradition at Harmonian funerals was not to speak, but to allow a priest to give a sermon, and that was the second time he'd almost broken down.

They buried him the day after they buried his daughter; more people showed up to the first one than to the second, sick either of funerals or of Albert and his sinking star. Leon came to both. Caesar didn't so much as acknowledge him. Albert had always been his favorite and Leon had never bothered to hide the fact, so speaking to him would be awkward at best, torturous at worst, especially without the buffer of genius and a prewritten speech. So Caesar did what he did best: he avoided the situation.

"Terrible affair," Nash said when he caught Caesar the first evening. "The whole of it."

"Yeah," Caesar agreed.

"Listen, I just want you to know - " Nash leaned in a little closer, his mouth grim, his eyes sympathetic. "I kept in contact with him, up 'til the end."

"I know," Caesar said.

"Yeah, well - he was..." Nash hesitated. "Not a happy man, after the incident. I just want you to know that this may all have been..." Again, a bit of hesitation. "For the best."

"Albert's dead," Caesar said, even though even to his ears it sounded listless, without the anger he wanted it to have.

"I know, and it's a terrible thing. But, I mean - " Again, with the greatest apology: "I think it's been over a year now since he died, you know?"

"I get it," Caesar said, and swallowed, remembered the way that Albert only came alive when they traveled, the way he'd looked when he'd first opened that door.

"Right," Nash said. "So don't blame yourself, right, kid?" He clapped Caesar on the shoulder. "Life goes on."

"Right up 'til the day we die," Caesar said, forcing a jovial note into his voice.

"Good lad." Nash sighed heavily, then grimaced apologetically, and said, "Seriously, forgive me, but - morbid curiosity - "

Caesar nodded. He understood. He hadn't exactly spread the story of how Albert had died: the priest directing the funeral knew, and that priest had passed the information on to everyone in the family Caesar hadn't been comfortable contacting or didn't know. Nash, however, probably wasn't related to them closely enough to have been informed - fourth cousin on their mother's side. He deserved to know.

"Albert wanted revenge, so we went after Yuber," he said tonelessly. "The demon Pesmerga was with us; I had contracted with him. It had been Albert's idea, and that had been his first mistake - there's room for only so much ruthlessness collected in one place." He smiled apologetically at his not-joke. "Yuber had...he'd put a key in Elissa, which would allow access to his - " Unable to keep the irony from his voice: "_Subterranean lair._ So we couldn't exact Albert's revenge without killing Elissa, and..." He shrugged, then looked up to see Nash horrified, transfixed.

"Albert..." Nash started, and a shock went through Caesar as he realized what he had implied.

"No. No." He swallowed. "No. Of course not. It was Pesmerga, he killed her, not Albert, Albert wouldn't..." Then he faltered, wondering if maybe Albert _would have - _but then he remembered what Albert had said about his daughter, his overwhelming love for her, and said stronger, "He wouldn't have. When he saw what Pesmerga had done, he threw himself at the demon."

"That was when he...?" Nash said, and Caesar nodded. Nash seemed to think about that a moment, then looked at Caesar. "Did you get him?"

"Who?"

"The demon." Nash gestured uncertainly. "Yuber."

Caesar stared, a little fascinated as he admitted, "I have no idea."

"Huh." Nash rubbed the back of his neck and sighed, a great exhalation that released the tension of the weighty matters they'd been discussing. "Well. Anything I can do for you? Anything you need? A lawyer..." Caesar shook his head; Nash raised his eyebrows. "A girl or two?"

"I need out of this country," Caesar said.

Nash smiled ruefully. "I know the feeling. I'm headed out west next week. Think you can wait that long?"

"I think so," Caesar said, and swallowed. He looked up at Nash and said, aware that he sounded a little pathetic, "In the old stories, you know, the folklore and what-have-you - aren't the demons supposed to leave something behind? They steal a child, and then they leave a gift."

"Well, everything I've learned about demons I learned from the missus, and I never listen to her so I'm not exactly an expert..." Nash looked over at Caesar as though hoping for a laugh, but Caesar was only able to manage a smile. So Nash shrugged and continued: "But in my understanding, the demons leave a curse. A changeling. A child of malice and disaster and death." His good humor was gone now; he chewed his lip thoughtfully. "If I were more philosophical, I might say Albert was left with a changeling indeed."

"He had his rage," Caesar said, "his obsession," and Nash tilted his head to the side and nodded and shrugged.

* * *

A woman had caught his attention on Sunday and kept it on Monday. She was lovely, a brittle blonde with rich clothing and big blue eyes who scattered red dirt on red maple for both father and daughter. He knew who she was. When he wandered away from his brother's headstone, feeling very lost and very young, she followed him, caught up to him, and laid a hand on his arm. 

"I'm sorry," she said. "Are you Caesar?" Caesar looked back at her; she nodded. "I'm Lydia. Albert's wife. I knew you were. You look just like him."

"Oh." What was he to say to that? Thank you? "Not many people say that."

"Oh," she said, shifted uncomfortably. He hadn't expected her to be so reticent, especially not with the breathlessness of that first rehearsed sentence. He felt a little embarrassed at his inability to think of something to say, but embarrassment didn't help him to think, so he stood silent. Finally, she said, painfully, "Do you have somewhere to be?"

"Not really," Caesar said, cast a glance over at where the old man was hobbling away from the open grave. "Why?"

The words were sudden and disastrous. "Would you like to come over to my place?"

"_What_?" Caesar asked.

She looked horrified, her big blue eyes gone flat. "Oh, no - not like that. Not like that." She shook her head and seemed to recover a little. "No. For a drink. Please."

_No, _he was going to say, _of course not; this is hardly a time for a drink, _and he was pretty sure he did say it, which was why he was startled when he looked up and noticed, somehow for the first time, that he'd ended up in a richly appointed house in one of the most fashionable districts, a house that smelled of new pine and sweetness. Lydia was pouring him a drink of something that he liked, so he must have been complicit in the situation.

"He was a good man," she was saying as she poured. And he thought, and wasn't sure he agreed, but she continued: "So brilliant. I could never keep up with his mind."

"Yes," he agreed, and accepted his drink. His mouth was dry, so he drained it for thirst; wordlessly, she filled it again. "He was always smarter than I was."

"Was he?" she asked, a sad little smile on her lips. "He was jealous of you."

Caesar blinked and pointed to himself. "Of me?" He shook his head. "Not of me."

"Of you, yes," she said. "His brother. He was jealous of you."

"That's..." he began, and found with the pressure behind his voice it was a bit difficult to finish. "That's impossible," he managed. "_He_ was the smart one. He was the favored child, the he was the one...the one who was supposed to...he was the scion. He _won. _But..." He cut himself off. "_Why_?" he asked, but in some way he understood because _he_ had always been jealous of _Albert_, because someone else's life always seemed easier to live. Lydia shook her head, and he took another drink but found it hard to swallow.

"I can't believe him," he whispered, and found his eyes wet. He looked down, and a moment later felt Lydia's arms around him, condescendingly pressing him like an infant to her brittle frame, and he banished his pain by focusing on his irritation.

"Shh," she whispered, but he pulled loose from her, swallowed and composed himself.

"Thank you," he said, a bit more sharply than he had intended. "I'm fine. Thank you."

She nodded and looked a little hurt, and he felt a little bad, doubly so when she asked, "You saw my Elissa, didn't you? Before she..._died_?"

He cleared his throat and remembered that she had a double grief under which to labor. "Yes."

Lydia nodded and swallowed. "My girl... How was she? Did she seem...happy?"

And what was he supposed to say to that? _Happy to live or happy to die? Death was release for your little girl, my fragile little niece with her skeletal face and her shrunken eyes, those eyes that were dead already - _would she then mourn less for the death but mourn more for the girl? Or if he lied, would that be crueler still, to give her the thought that she might have had her Elissa back again -

He went the middle route. "Yes," he said, simply.

Lydia pressed her fingers to her mouth and nodded jerkily. "All right," she said. "All right. I'm glad."

"Yes," he said again, quietly, uncertainly. He looked down, then up again, and she had started to cry, and he just sat there awkwardly and sipped at his drink as she kept on crying.

"I'm sorry," she whispered. "I'm so so sorry. Here." Sobbing, her hands clenched convulsively around the decanter, she poured his glass full again, then set the decanter aside. He gave her hand a comforting uncertain little touch, and she twisted it around and gripped his.

"Oh," she sobbed, looking up at him, her eyes perfect even in crying, "oh, oh, oh, no - " and then she leaned forward and kissed him softly. And maybe because she was beautiful or maybe because he was drunk, he kissed her back, kissed his brother's widow and cooled himself against her flesh so thin he felt the bones beneath. And he loved her for the feel of her mortality. His spirit was satisfied in the emptiness.

And she leaned forward, kissed him even harder, her shoulders still moving compulsively with her sobs, and he was so absorbed that it he didn't recognize the strange pull against his belt until he felt her long cold hand as it slipped inside his pants and started to caress the flesh beneath. He broke away and pulled back so fast he wondered if her fragile hand wouldn't get caught and snap off in his waistline.

"What are you doing?" he asked, unable to conceal his horror. "Fuck! What are you _doing?_"

There was a moment when she flushed, and her pale hair contrasted oddly as the skin darkened. It baffled the eye. "I'm just looking for _comfort,_" she whispered, holding the hand that had been searching like it was a tool, not a part of her. "You might be _considerate_."

He couldn't control the snort that burst from his lips and made her flush even darker. "Oh, I see. Albert's not even an hour underground, he's not even _cold _- "

"He was _always_ cold," she said.

"Oh, don't yousay a _- _" Caesar hissed, but even he wasn't sure if his anger stemmed from her disrespect or the fact that she felt as though _she_ were the expert on Albert's coldness. "You stupid piece of - if there was a lack of love, sure as _fuck _wasn't from him - "

She cut him off with a hiss even darker and harder than the one before, gripping his wrist. "Don't you _dare_ presume to belittle my relationship. Don't you _dare _belittle my grief. What's your place? You could _never_ understand. He was _my _husband!"

He pried her hand off his, furious despite himself, despite the fact that he knew this woman was petty and stupid and selfish. "And he was my _brother_," he said, trying to keep his voice steady. It trembled and wavered nevertheless. "Don't you dare talk about that like it's nothing."

Perhaps it was his intensity, perhaps it was his stillness, but her taut trembling rage faded a little. "I loved him," she whined.

"You left him," he spat.

She roused herself: "So did you."

"No I didn't," he said. "He was the one who abandoned me. _Fuck,_" he whispered, shook his head and backed away a few more steps. "You made him leave. You kept the house he bought for you."

"He asked me to take it," she said.

"Of course he did. That's what he does. Did. That's what he..._Fuck._" He clenched his fist. "This was such a mistake. This was all just such a damn mistake."

"You can't blame him for that," the widow said strangely, and he looked up at her.

"Was I blaming him?" Caesar asked. "I can take responsibility. I'm not like _you_ are."

Her face twisted in on itself into something ugly and red and recognizable, and he thought to himself, _Finally, a demon that looks like it's supposed to. _"Go to _hell,_" she whispered, and picked up her glass and hurled it at him. It smashed on the wall beside him. A stray fragment sliced his forehead. Bleeding, he laughed and waited for more, but her rage was used up by that one gesture - she slumped back, her eyes streaming and her shoulders shaking but her face slack. And Caesar was disappointed, almost _angry_ at her quick catharsis, that easy release. He almost went over to her then, almost took her shoulders and shook her to tell her _Don't you think this is over._

But he held himself back, turned instead to lace his boots back up. With head away, he said to her, "You know, when Albert was little, he always had bad taste in girls. Guess he still does." And there was almost a moment when he wanted to amend himself, to say something else either because that wasn't very scathing or because he'd gotten the tense wrong again, but he stopped himself. Then he straightened, walked out without looking back at her and slammed the door closed behind him and hurried off, almost afraid that she'd follow after him to get the last word. She didn't.

An hour later, he was urging his horse from Harmonia, lusting after nothing so much as the border, wanting nothing so much as to never again see this country, commitments be damned.

* * *

He met a girl on the trip back, five years his junior with glossy dark hair, who was dropping out of Soledt Academy where she had been studying ancient runes. Her name was Lil, and she liked the same kinds of wine as he did and laughed at his jokes and didn't presume that he would share her rather dull interests, and she had a cousin with the falling sickness and didn't much care that he had it, so he married her. Two years later they had a son. Caesar sort of wanted to name him Albert for a little while, but they went with Julian instead. 

A year after that, he started to see shadows from the corners of his eyes, phantoms to unsettle him if not to make him jump. It was then that he started to wonder for the first time since his conversation with Nash whether it was Pesmerga or Yuber who had won, after he had turned back. The thought unsettled him.

He moved his family a month later from Gregminster to Muse, even though Lil, pregnant again, hated the idea. It brought relief a while. Still, it wasn't long before he started to once again see things. He'd turn and see a shadow slinking among shadows like a cat in tall grass. Every time, he'd try to shrug it off, but soon it consumed his thoughts. At night he'd hold his Lil and listen, afraid to hear his child's cry.

_-End_


End file.
